WIESBADEN (dpa-AFX) – In the financial dispute over the care of the many refugees, Hesse’s Prime Minister Boris Rhein has rejected statements by Federal Finance Minister Christian Lindner. “What the federal government pays is far from enough,” said the CDU politician to the German Press Agency. “The amount of 2.75 billion euros for this year must be at least doubled. It was clear from the start: If the number of refugees increases, the amount of aid from the federal government must also increase.”
Rhein added: “If the Federal Minister of Finance is already announcing – a month before the refugee summit in the Chancellery – that there will be no additional money for the federal states and local authorities, then I am very excited to see what generous help the Federal Chancellor and his cabinet are going to give to the battered cities, Municipalities and counties will otherwise offer.” At a federal-state summit with Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) on May 10th, the refugee costs will be discussed.
Lindner had previously defended the amount of federal funding provided. “The federal government is already providing massive support to the federal states. We have all received the citizens’ income from the refugees from Ukraine, which means that the federal government pays for their living expenses, although the federal states are actually responsible,” said the head of the FDP to the “Rheinische Post” ( Saturday). Financially, the states are in better shape than the federal government, which had to take on large debts due to the crises and is facing enormous challenges. “In this respect, the federal government should actually ask the federal states for support and not vice versa,” said Lindner.
Hesse’s Prime Minister Rhein argued that it was “the federal government alone that holds the key to immigration”. “The federal government must control and limit migration – in the interests of humanity and order,” he said. “If the federal government continues to fail to control and limit migration, it will have to assume all the more financial responsibility for its own migration policy.” It cannot be “that the federal states and municipalities have to pay for the failed policy of the federal government”.
